Update: On January 2, the California Supreme Court rejected the San Bernardino police officers union request for a ruling on the effective date of SB 1421 and stay. By denying, SB 1421 goes into effect this morning and no further appeal is possible. See ruling below
When Governor Jerry Brown, somewhat to the surprise of many, signed Senate Bill 1421 in his last year as the governor of California, it was the dawn of a potential new era in transparency about the use of force, and sexual assault and evidence planting by California’s police officers.
But before the new bill even went into effect, a pitched legal battle began in the courts – and in city councils with shredders – throughout the state.
First off, on December 19, the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Employees’ Benefit Association asked a court to determine if Senate Bill 1421 applied retroactively i.e. to incidents that had occurred prior to January 1, 2019 – and to pause the bill’s enactment until the court decided. You can read the complaint below.
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Then, on December 22, word hit the newspapers that the City of Inglewood had decided to shred investigative and disciplinary police records for use of force incidents that were older than five years. The City had formerly kept them for up to 25 years. The City Council changed the storage policy and authorized the shredding quietly at an unrecorded City Council meeting on December 11th. Inglewood insists the change was unrelated to the passage of Senate Bill 1421 and the possibility that some of the records might now be subject to public records requests. It is unclear if the shredding ordered by the City Council has occurred yet. The City of Long Beach did the same on December 18th, also claiming the decision was unrelated to the new law.
On December 28, a coalition of transparency and journalism organizations that included the LA Times, KQED-FM, the California Newspaper Publishers Assn and the First Amendment Center attempted to intervene in the San Bernardino lawsuit to preserve the law.
SB1421-Petition California-Courts-Appellate-Court-Case-Information[/read]